There is actually a website dedicated to the dropping of the Little Boy on Hiroshima and the Captain responsible.

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It's filled with lots of propaganda and other euphemisms to hide and obfuscate the fact that America committed mass genocide to end mass genocide.

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That should be correct, Spectre had a ] on the end.

Crud.. forgot the http..etc

check the caption on the pic lower right.

That spitfire is a mark that I must have missed.
This is my reponse to sidebar POS, on the FS message board: http://boards.gamers.com/messages/message_view.asp?name=games&id=zzvhg

[This message has been edited by plummerx (edited 11-25-2000).]

[This message has been edited by plummerx (edited 11-25-2000).]

As for an invasion of Japan costing millions of lives, some of the men who could know did not agree with that. Douglas McArthur estimated casualties of 36,000 dead, C.W. Nimitz 11,000 (limited to the first half of the invasion plan) and the joint planners 38,000. These estimates were limited to losses on the side of the allies. Assuming Japanese losses were 10 times as high, you're nowhere near a million.

The 'millions' came from Harry Truman and Winston Churchill, and were made after the war when the Allies started looking for something to quite their conscience and 'sell' the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to the public. These estimates ranged from 500,000 dead to 2,000,000 dead, sometimes on both sides, sometimes on the side of the allies.
An interesting theory even goes so far to say that the bomb was used to impress the Soviets and improve the West's bargaining position after the war. I don't think I want to believe that, but I can't rule out the possibility...

If you want to read on the subject, I can recommend these two books:

J.R. Skates, The Invasion of Japan - Alternative to the Bomb

Alperovitz, G., Atomic Diplomacy: From Hiroshima to Potsdam

BTW, I am not anti-American or something. I'm Dutch, which means I owe my freedom to America and its allies. However, I think some of these issues can and should be looked at from both sides.

Plummerx, you're a pretty good writer, if you wrote that yourself (must have taken you some time). If not, please give credit where it's due. If yes, looking forward to reading more of it, but please be a little more objective, and don't forget that it's often the winner of a war that writes it's history.

And that caption is pretty unbelievably stupid, right.

[This message has been edited by s_roubos (edited 11-27-2000).]

Japan was negotiating surrender when the bomb was dropped. It was highly likely an end could have been brought to the war without dropping that horrible thing.

>I agree with bhodi, America should never be compared with the atrocities committed by the Germans to the Jews and the Japanese to the Chinese.

Why not? Like bhodi said, war is Hell. Both sides committed atrocities during WWII, although German and Japanese atrocities were far more numerous, and often organized. But IMHO it is wrong to deny the facts. The world is not black and white, it's countless shades of grey. People are capable of doing terrible things, whether they're German (Auschwitz), Japanese (Nanking), American (My Lai) or Dutch (Atjeh). Don't deny it, learn from it.

>There is a penalty for willingly accepting tryanny as ones form of daily existance. That fate is concurrant with that of the tyrant.

Civilians should NEVER pay the price for the actions of their government, especially not in a dictatorship. Put yourself in the place of one of those people in Nagasaki.

While I was in college in the US last year, taking a course on the development and the use of the Bomb, we watched a short movie made days after the bombing of Nagasaki by a Western moviemaker. It was only about 15 minutes, and it was of pretty bad quality, but the images of some of the victims made a couple of students so sick they ran out of the room. I didn't feel too well myself after watching it. It made a lot of students reconsider their opinion about the use of the Bomb.

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Originally posted by s_roubos:
Japan was negotiating surrender when the bomb was dropped. It was highly likely an end could have been brought to the war without dropping that horrible thing.

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People are capable of doing terrible things, whether they're German (Auschwitz), Japanese (Nanking), American (My Lai) or Dutch (Atjeh). Don't deny it, learn from it.

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It is obscene to mention Auschwitz or Nanking in the same breath or sentence as My Lai as if to suggest some equality between them.

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While I was in college in the US last year, taking a course on the development and the use of the Bomb, we watched a short movie made days after the bombing of Nagasaki by a Western moviemaker. It was only about 15 minutes, and it was of pretty bad quality, but the images of some of the victims made a couple of students so sick they ran out of the room. I didn't feel too well myself after watching it. It made a lot of students reconsider their opinion about the use of the Bomb.

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I can only guess that a few minutes of footage from the Rape of Nanking would have had them assaulting the teacher for so offending their senses.

I think that its excellent that historical discourse is taking place here. While we obviously enjoy simming (for any side) its easy to forget what is being recreated.

Hopefully we can continue this discussion without getting into personal nastiness.

Now for the bomb.

Japan knew exactly what had happened to them when the first bomb was dropped. They had been developing their own nuclear technology in assistance with the Germans. At the time of the surrender, a german submarine was still onroute to Japan delivering treated uranium for further experimentation. The japanese had even built and used a cyclotron, a particle accelerator neccessary for the development and exerimentation in atomic physics. When the SCAP moved into Japan, one of the first things they did was ditch the cyclotron into the Pacific. The Japanese, apparently, were not that close to, nor sufficiently advanced in certain fields of physics to build an atomic bomb in the forseable future but they were able to produce a report the day after Hiroshima on the "Atomic Blast" and its effects.

None of this really contributes to the discussion of how right or wrong it was of the allied forces to use the bomb, twice, to force a surrender.

I agree with many others that an invasion of Japan would have cost many lives. Battles on Iwo Jima and Okinawa illustrate this point. I do think, however, that there were factors that hurried the Allies into using the bomb and I think that there were alternatives that were not explored.

At the time of Japan's seemingly imminent invasion, a Japanese Prince was negotiating peace with Russia in Moscow. The Americans were well aware of this. A more suspicious person may think that the bombs were used to force a surrender to the US and avoid having Japan become a communist country. (and please, lets not argue on the merits/faults of communism!!!!)

As for options. I think all of us find it hard to argue that TWO bombs were needed. It wasn't a matter of Japan failing to surrender by a deadline. In the Imperial Bunker how to surrender was being discussed by cabinet and the armed forces.

Another option could have been to drop the bomb within close proximety to Tokyo...or any other major city so that the effects could be seen without the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians. Lets be honest here, neither Hiroshima or Nagasaki were military targets by any stretch of the imagination. Hiroshima had a very very small HQ....Nagasaki had no real military assets save those of the civilian militia.

In many ways the targets were selected based on the experimental data that could be gained from the results. Hiroshima was untouched so that the effects could be measured on a flat city. Nagasaki, despite being a secondary target was selected to see how a hilly city would be affected.

To me, to decide on a target based on its geography, ignoring the military value of the strike, at a time when surrender to Russia seemed imminent and to do it TWICE seems excessive.

It sounds bizarre, and I have trouble sorting it out in my mind, but I think 1 bomb would have been OK...but two was too many. Thats assuming that the Western Allies HAD to drop it on a city at all. Many Japanese friends of mine, many who actually served in WWII believe that the bomb was neccessary and, in the end, a good thing for Japan.

From this perspective thats understandable.

Sayonara!

Well said! So far it's been above average, I think.

Snake Driver:
>It is obscene to mention Auschwitz or Nanking in the same breath or sentence as My Lai as if to suggest some equality between them.

I am not suggesting equality between these events. I am only illustrating my opinion that people from all countries are capable of doing terrible things. I just re-read what happened at My Lai, and it would qualify as terrible, but I do agree I shouldn't have included it here. Please read on to find out why.

What set the acts of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan apart from other acts of cruelty was the fact that these were industrialized nations led by dictatorial, imperialistic (add psychotic if you want) regimes. This allowed them to bring the concept of mass-murder to unprecedented levels. I would never suggest that the US, at any time in its history, is comparable to either of these nations. I do suggest that some of the actions taken by the US (and other countries) in WWII (and other wars) were excessive to say the least in light of their strategic value. Hiroshima and Nagasaki are examples of this, as are Rotterdam, Guernica and Warzaw. These were attacks on civilians, serving no useful strategic purpose.
I admit I should not have included My Lai, because it wasn't an organized act by a nation, unlike these civilian bombings. The Holocaust should indeed not be mentioned in the same sentence as My Lai, because the former surpassed by any measure any other crime ever committed. My apologies, a bad example. That does not mean that I don't consider My Lai a warcrime, by the way.

I hope I am not making people mad with my arguments, that's not my goal. Remember, my arguments are based on my opinion that civilians should not have to pay for the acts of their government, or be the target of one country's agression against another. We have armies for that. I realize that civilians will never stay clear of the fighting in modern wars, but a country cannot attack an opponent's civilian population as a way of winning. This is what happened in Hiroshima, Nanking, Hamburg and Rotterdam. We should condemn it in all its forms, because none of us want to be on the receiving end of such an act.

No more preaching, I gotta get some sleep

Japan WAS negotiating a peace...with the western powers, via the Russians.

Your suggestion inplies that had the Japanese not surrendered after 2 bombs, more would have been dropped until they had. I'm not sure that the US/Truman was prepared to do that.

There was a very real possibility that allied POW's in the far east would have been murdered in the event of an invasion of Japan. (Preparations were underway). The nuclear attacks probably prevented another atrocity.

I am firmly in the "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen" camp". No-one asked the Japanese to invade south east Asia, attack Pearl Harbor, etc. And it is very easy now, with the benefit of hindsight, to criticize the way they were stopped. Perhaps someone on the forum can finish the quote about "reaping the whirlwind".

As a son of a Burma railway builder I know I am only here because Hiroshima and Nagasaki were attacked.

Harsh on the citizens of those cities, but the alternatives were hardly pleasant. War is not pleasant.

Towards the end of the Pacific War, the execution of captured Allied aircrews became almost automatic. Courts-martial were dispensed with on orders from the
Military Police Headquarters. In the Tokai Military District, twenty-seven airmen were executed by firing squad, but often, less humane methods were used. In the
Japanese Army Prison in Tokyo all the buildings were built of wood and into this prison were crammed 464 Japanese soldiers serving sentences. Also confined in the
prison were 62 American airmen who earlier were shot down and captured. During the night of May 25, 1945, Tokyo was heavily bombed by the US Air Force and
the prison was hit by incendiaries. In the conflagration which followed, all the 62 airmen were burned to death. A significant factor in this incident was that none of
the Japanese prisoners or any of the prison guards suffered a similar fate. The failure of the Japanese to release the 62 flyers could only have been deliberate.
KYUSHU UNIVERSITY ATROCITY

After a bombing mission over southern Japan on May 5, 1945, the crew of a B-29 bomber had to bale out after being rammed by a Japanese suicide plane. After
landing, they were taken into custody and transported to Kyushu University in ***uoka. In the university hospital they were subjected to the most horrible medical
experiments imaginable. One prisoner was shot in the stomach so that Japanese surgeons could get practice at removing bullets. Amputations on legs and arms were
practised while the victims were still alive. One was injected with sea water in an experiment to find out if sea water could be substituted for saline solution. One
badly wounded American, thinking he was going to be treated for his wound, was anaesthetized and woke up to find that one of his lungs had been removed. He
died shortly after. Others had part of the liver removed to see if they could still live. Only one airman, the pilot of the B-29, Captain Marvin Watkins, was taken to Tokyo
for interrogation but survived the war. The other eight all died at ***uoka. After the war, twenty three doctors and hospital staff were arrested, tried and found guilty
on various charges by the Allied War Crimes Trials held at Yokohama. Five were sentenced to death, the others to terms of imprisonment. When the Korean war
started in June, 1950, General Douglas MacArthur reduced most of the sentences. The death sentences were never carried out. All were released by 1958. This was
the only instance where Americans were used in bizarre medical experiments in WW11, except perhaps at Mukden. "

[This message has been edited by plummerx (edited 11-28-2000).]

I just reckon that leveling 2 cities with little strategic value with atomic blasts was over the top.

Arguing that the citizenry got everything they deserved is extremely callous and not based on an understanding of the role of ordinary citizens in WWII.

I also suspect there there is an nasty racist edge to the decision to field test atomic weapons in an Asian country. I can't help but wonder if, had Germany clung on a bit longer, the western Allies would have been prepared to erase a city there? The political dynamics of th whole region would be very different now, hey.

BTW, please don't take this to mean that I reckon any of you are racist.

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Originally posted by Frug:
I also suspect there there is an nasty racist edge to the decision to field test atomic weapons in an Asian country. I can't help but wonder if, had Germany clung on a bit longer, the western Allies would have been prepared to erase a city there?

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Dresden.

I hope you'll be so kind as to forgive the blood-thirsty, racist, greedy, Americans of the time if they happened to remember that the Japanese were negotiating while the attack on Pearl Harbor was launched.

You might want to visit some of the territory that American's "seized" and still occupy in far off lands....they're called Military Cemeteries.

I will have to say this is probably the most non-flammatory right/wrong political discussion I have seen lately. Good job on the restraints shown by all.

Now, for my .02 cents worth.

Japan was negotiating (they thought) for a peaceful solution to the war with Russia before the a-bombs were dropped. But, didn't Russia walk away from those discussions and declare war officially against Japan immediately after those discussions? Didn't Russia see an opportunity to regain some lost territory from the previous conflicts with Japan that it had lost?

I have seen it mentioned, but not in the context that I am going to use it in. Didn't the fire bombings over Tokyo kill more civilians than Hiroshima and Nagasaki? The bombing of Germany around the clock for over 3 years?

The one point I do agree upon that everyone here has probably either made or thought of is the war is hell. The bad thing about war is that most of the time the people that actually start one (fanatical leaders with desires of world domination) are not the people that end up taking the brunt of the retaliation. Yes...Hitler, Mussolini and the military leaders of Japan did in the end pay for their actions, but not until their people had payed an even higher price. Why? The proproganda machines of each of the above listed "leaders" kept the masses in the dark for the most part. Hitler had told his people the "Britain was on the verge of defeat" in 1940. Less than a week later, Berlin was bombed.

Take January 1991 to March 1991 for example. How many Iraqis do you think actually knew for sure that there would be swift retaliation by the Coalition forces for the invasion and takeover of Kuwait? I'm pretty sure that Saddam's PIO department had painted a pretty picture of what Iraq's capabilities where and what the "inadequencies" of the opposition was.

My last thought is this. No matter who starts a war, the people of the agressor nation will be the ones that pay the most for it. And the most of them won't have any choice in the matter.

Thanks for listening...

As a hypothetical...(no Geoffrey Robertson here)...I wonder how well Japan would have gone if they'd left America out of the conflict. They certainly overestimated how keen the US was to get into an Asian-Pacific conflict.

They had already made great strides in China (assisted by a quasi civil war) and fared well in Russia.....

In Germany, although Hitler got to power through a democratic system, he never actually got enough votes to gain power. He only became chancellor through forming a coalition with another party (I forget which one). And once in power, there's not much the populace can do against a ruling party with a fanatical secret police.

The fire bombings in Germany were on a similar scale with the Hiroshima/Nagasaki, and their effects on the outcome of the war are now seen to be minimal.

Many people say that these kind of acts are OK, as the Allies were just retaliating after similar acts by the Axis powers (eg the bombing of Coventry,London etc). But if, as has been claimed in this thread, the allies were fighting against evil, then how can we possibly justify lowering ourselves to use the same methods as these "evil" people.

Some reckon that Japanese citizens deserved the A Bombs because they didn't rise up against the military regime.

That was not possible. Those who have studied Japan know this. There was very little/no free expression of opinion by citizens. Remember that this was a time when propaganda was all they got fed. There was no alternative news source....and like our countries now....everything has a politcal spin. Its easy for us now, with a multitude of news sources (that mostly say the same thing) to wonder why no uprising took place....but when you are told that everything is just fine...and all this will be over soon if we just struggle a little harder....why woudn't you believe it?

Moreover, there was a secret police organisation that terrorised the populace. Its not easy to talk about your concerns when everyone, including your own children, could dob you in to save their own skin.

They were starkly different times for what was, even by standards of the time, an extremely naieve nation.

Lastly, some other writers claim having a rellie who fought or even died in the conflict justifies the assertion that the bomb was neccessary. While I have a talked about the neccessity of not one but TWO bombs before, having a personal link to the conflict does not change my opinion.

My grandfather fought for in the Australian Infantry in Papua New Guinea along the Kokoda trail and later in New britain and a number of little islands. He hates Japanese people, and I can understand that. Its hard to kill people you don't hate. (but then again...what would I know...I've never killed anyone)

His stories bring home to me the reality and horror of his experience. War is hell. Other people are being paid to see you dead.

I've also been to Hiroshima and Nagasaki a number of times to see the memorials there.

Without going into details, I can tell you that the photos and legacy of the blast have scarred those cities forever. If you can walk through those museums and still hold your head high and claim it was neccessary then you are a colder man than I.

oh well....

Please read an earlier post of mine on the 'neccessity' of two atomic bombs.

I must admit, it saddens me that for some the death of around 140,000 men, women and children as the result of one weapon was OK.

The final toll is thought to be 200,000 once people died of exposure to radiation.

Either way, to justify that a child needs to die to save "EVEN 1 ALLIED SOLDIER" hardly elevates us, the perceived goodies in the war, to any dizzy heights of righteousness.

So here's a recipe that's sure to keep you awake. And remember, there's no such thing as too much caffiene!

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Surprise! Coffee Roast has been handpicked at Allrecipes.com® and sent to you by Mrs. Z. Visit http://allrecipes.com today to search the Internet's most complete collection of America's favorite recipes, cooking tips, seasonal menus, grocery savings and more.

Coffee Roast
Submitted by: Arrianna and Tom
An absolute favorite of my meat-and-veggies-only man. This brings him home every time!! I love this recipe. Fuss-free preparation, but it takes some thinking ahead for cooking time. Tender beef simmered in roasted coffee. Absolutely delicious.
Servings: 6

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons butter
4 pounds chuck roast
1 tablespoon butter
salt to taste
1 onion, chopped
6 cups brewed coffee
2 cups canned mushrooms
3 tablespoons cornstarch

Directions:
1. Melt 2 tablespoons of butter in a large saucepan over medium high heat. Add the roast and sear on all sides until well browned; set aside.
2. In the same saucepan, melt the remaining butter, add the salt and onions and saute for 5 minutes. Return the meat to the saucepan and pour in the coffee and the mushrooms.
3. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer for 5 hours, turning meat over halfway through cooking time.
4. To make gravy: Remove a cup of the coffee mixture from the saucepan, combine with the cornstarch, stirring until smooth, and return to the simmering pan. Mix well, remove from heat and serve.

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To get this recipe's nutritional information, read reviews about it, check its ratings, change the number of servings or add this recipe to your shopping list, view the online version at http://beefrecipe.com/recipes/recipefromemail.asp?id=274

Copyright 2000 http://allrecipes.com

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Don't take this so personally guys!